Amy Linden Interview
Amy Linden is an educator and music critic/journalist. Her work has appeared in numerous publications including The Source, The New York Times, and many more. She served as a consultant for the Academy Award-winning documentary Amy, and is also the co-host and co-producer of the pop culture podcast ImmaLetYouFinish.
How did you get to where you are today, professionally?
As a teenager I would spend hours at my local library reading music mags like Creem, Crawdaddy, and Rolling Stone (I guess my library was kind of cool, in hindsight). I started to recognize bylines (a major Charles M. Young fan as a kid) and just thought the whole idea of writing about music was fascinating. I was already a big music fan and I liked to write.
Cut to about three years later when I’m living in SF and was part of the city’s punk scene. It’s about 1979 and I’d seen the Pistols last show a few months earlier and my life was changed. To this day I can’t recall how it happened, but I became friends with folks who were working on a newspaper/zine called Damage, which in simplistic terms was SF’s version of LA’s Slash in that it focused on local and nationwide acts. Next thing I know I’m writing record reviews and then I get my first feature assignment; interviewing The Cramps at what would be Bryan Gregory’s last (or close to last) show. I then interviewed Gang of Four and then, while back home on vacation in NYC, Bush Tetras.